A journal of my thoughts and feelings regarding the strange journey that is my life.

Wednesday, June 18, 2008

It is finished

So, here is the thing...It's one thing to screw something up and disappoint yourself...it is an entirely different thing to screw up and disappoint someone you love. And in this case I paid the price with my self respect.

Since Peter passed, there are days, weeks even where I kinda float through my day in a bit of a fog. I get overwhelmed with all that I need/have/want to do. Balancing the kids needs with my own is a constant struggle and I have no one now to share that burden with. I tend to put their needs ahead of mine and that's where Dana's dance class comes into the picture.

I put Dana back in dance class the summer after Peter died. She still enjoyed it and I wanted to keep everything as normal as possible...so off I went every week. The thing is, that the last event Peter got to do with us as a family was going to her dance recital in June. He had been in horrible pain sitting through the recital and I could hardly pay attention my self with my worry over him. As a result, bad memories associated with dance stay with me. Attending the recital is always highly emotional.

So Dana did dance again this year. It was a larger class and made up of many Moms with young kids/babies. It was crowded and noisy and just unpleasant waiting for her to be done with class each week. Sienna needed to sit there and do her homework, forcing me to sit there as well and listen to many of these women complain about their husbands, when all I wanted to do was slap them upside the head and tell them to thank their lucky stars their husbands were alive and healthy.

I hated going each week to say the least. Sometimes I would block it out and just forget to go...And now we get to the meat and potatoes of the story! I FORGOT TO GO TO THE DRESS REHEARSAL! Now this is a huge mistake. It is clearly stated in the agreement with the studio that attendance in the recital is contingent on attending the dress rehearsal. I screwed up big time and now my daughter was going to be punished for my mistake. I was to see her instructor the next day for class and hoped I could persuade her to make an exception. Well I got a phone call that next morning from her teacher, who proceeded to verbally accost me. Now you have to understand I have never had any interaction of significance with the instructor over the past 3 years. Our exchanges have always been pleasant and unremarkable. Even so, you get a general feeling about a person and I never would have expected in a million years the exchange that was to take place. I felt like a deer in the head lights being repeatedly rammed by an SUV. I was very apologetic and showed the appropriate contrition given the egregious mistake I had made, yet nothing I said seemed to satisfy her. How many times in how many ways can you say you are sorry and that you really messed up? I cried, I begged, she just kept repeating over and over her policy that if you don't attend the rehearsal you can't be in the show. After 20 minutes of this I finally said "Look is there some other way I should be apologizing? (was she looking for a bribe?) At that point she must of felt she extracted her pound of flesh and that I had suffered enough. I can only imagine how stressed she was getting ready for the show...but come on. I allowed my self to be the punching bag she needed to get out her frustrations, and gave her the power trip over deciding Dana's fate, I guess she needed to feel in control that's for sure. And all for the price of my dignity and self respect. Boy she made out real well in that exchange.

If this wouldn't have affected Dana I would have had it out with her. She just wanted to beat someone up. If she wasn't going to let her in the show she could have simply called and stated her policy, express her disappointment and be done in under 3 min. She knew she was going to let her be in it, but wanted to make me suffer first. BUT I AM DONE! FINISHED! NEVER will I do DANCE CLASS again!!!!!!